Christopher Leslie: My right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister and I are jointly publishing today the Government response to the Electoral Commission's report "Voting for change".
	In its report "Voting for change: An electoral law modernisation programme", the Electoral Commission has made a range of proposals and recommendations for electoral reform to address the needs of the voter and make elections more accessible, to protect the integrity of the democratic process, and to modernise electoral registers. The Commission advocates the modernisation of registers, which would involve the introduction of individual registration building block on which safe and secure arrangements for voting away from polling stations could be delivered.
	Our response welcomes many of the Electoral Commission's recommendations and sets out our priorities for change. These are focussed on three key outcomes: engaging more people in the political process; building public confidence in the electoral system; and delivering electoral services in a way that is more efficient and more responsive to the needs of the voter.
	We are committed to maintaining the security and integrity of the electoral process and to enhancing its openness and transparency. We will ensure that any innovative methods of voting that are introduced will be as, secure if not more secure, than the traditional methods. Specifically we are proposing, when parliamentary time allows:
	To introduce measures to make ballot papers more secure.
	To establish new offences around electoral fraud and personation.
	To provide for clear English guidance to accompany postal ballot papers and for guidance tokey statutory forms to be available in different languages and alternative formats for those who need them.
	To give greater access to observers at polling stations and at other stages of the electoralprocess, such as the count.
	We are sympathetic to the principles of individual registration and appreciate the benefits that it might bring, but are concerned about maintaining a simple and clear system, and comprehensive registers. We are therefore considering the options to support voting away from polling stations with an approach that preserves the completeness and integrity of electoral registers.
	We hope that the publication of this response will substantially move forward the modernisation agenda for elections.
	Copies of this Government response to the Electoral Commission's report will be placed in the Libraries of both Houses.

Adam Ingram: My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Defence informed the House in his statement on 21 July, Official Report, column 348, that changes in the force structure of the RAF and the achievement of planned organisational efficiencies would lead to a reduced RAF trained manpower requirement of around 41,000 by 2008. I can now inform the House that the RAF has completed initial work on how this reduction will be achieved, while maintaining a satisfactory balance of personnel with the skills and experience levels throughout the service to enable the delivery of operational capability in a more flexible, deployable and responsive way.
	The RAF will achieve the required reduction, from a current regular trained strength of around 48,900, through a balanced strategy of normal outflow, reduced recruitment and a targeted redundancy programme. The service is therefore reducing its recruitment targets by some 4,000 (to around 6,000 in total) over the next three financial years and has identified a need for some 2,750 redundancies over the same period. Redundancy will be effected by a compulsory scheme, for which applications will be invited. It is hoped that as many of the redundancies as possible will be applicants but, in order to ensure the long-term balance of ability and experience across the RAF, it may not be possible to accept all applications received, in which case, it may be necessary to select some non-applicants.
	Applications for the first 450 redundancies are being invited today and those selected will leave the service by 31 March 2006. Details of the remaining redundancies (approximately 2,300), which are expected to be managed in two further phases, will be notified to RAF personnel when further work is complete.

Planning for Telecommunication Developments

Electoral Commission Report (Delivering Democracy?)

Elliot Morley: The Government is today publishing for consultation the draft Waste Management (England and Wales) Regulations 2005. The main purposes of the draft regulations, and the associated draft commencement order, are (a) to repeal the exclusion in section 75(7)(c) of the Environmental Protection Act 1990; and (b) to apply to agricultural waste, and to non-mineral waste from mines and quarries, the national controls that are already in place to comply with the waste framework directive (75/442/EEC as amended by 91/156/EEC and Commission decision 96/350/EC) and the landfill directive (1999/31/EC).
	The exclusion in section 75(7)(c) of the 1990 Act is the subject of infraction proceedings and the European Commission has applied to the European Court of Justice for a declaration that it contravenes the waste framework directive. The exclusion is also the subject of infraction on the landfill directive. The Government has accepted that the exclusion contravenes the directives and has given a commitment to repeal it and to introduce, after consultation, the regulations necessary:
	to apply the existing waste management controls which the UK has in place to transpose the requirements of the directives;
	to waste which is at present excluded from the definition of "controlled waste" under section 75(7)(c) of the 1990 Act; and
	which is not excluded from control under the directives by article 2 of the waste framework directive.
	The main subject of the draft regulations is agricultural waste. At present, most agricultural waste is disposed of on-farm in an unregulated way—by open burning, by burial or by disposal in "farm dumps". The objective of the draft regulations is to ensure that agricultural waste is managed and recovered or disposed of in ways which protect the environment and human health. The controls will be enforced by the Environment Agency, as the "competent authority" in England and Wales, in ways which are proportionate to the risk to the environment and human health. The existing controls have applied to all other sectors of industry and types of waste since May 1994 in the case of the waste framework directive; and since June 2002 in the case of the landfill directive.
	The Government proposes to make the regulations under section 2 of the Pollution Prevention and Control Act 1999 and the consultation is being carried out in compliance with section 2(4) of the Act. The draft regulations fulfil the commitments made by the Government in the Action Plan For Farming which is available on my Department's website at http://www. defra.gov.uk/farm/agendtwo/strategv/action.htm; and they have been developed in consultation with the Agricultural Waste Stakeholders' Forum whose membership and terms of reference are available at www.defra.gov.uk/environment/waste/agforum/index.htm.
	The draft regulations are being published for a 14-week consultation period with responses being invited by 18 March 2005. The consultation paper includes a partial regulatory impact assessment. A summary of the consultation paper, with a pull-out questionnaire, is being sent to 162,000 farmers and growers in England and Wales. Both the consultation paper and the summary are available on my Department's website at http://www.defra.gov.uk/corporate/consult/default.asp.
	The Government has agreed to provide up to £l million over 2005–2008 from the business resource efficiency and waste (BREW) programme to help improve the sustainability of agricultural waste management following the application of the directives' controls to the agricultural industry.
	The draft regulations also contain some related or consequential amendments to existing regulations. The main such amendments are:
	(a) To ensure continuing compliance with the waste framework directive following the repeal of the animal waste directive (90/667/EEC) and the introduction of the EU Animal By-Products Regulation ((EC) No. 1774/2002) which lays down health rules concerning animal by-products not intended for human consumption. The proposed amendments apply to animal by-products which are waste within the meaning of article l(a) of the waste framework directive and are not excluded from the directive's scope under article 2; and
	(b) To repeal regulation 15 of the Waste Management Licensing Regulations 1994 and to amend the Groundwater Regulations 1998 to bring waste management licensing into line with other types of "authorisations" for the purposes of complying with the groundwater directive (80/68/EEC).

David Blunkett: As part of the continuing commitment to prepare and protect the UK. I have signed a memorandum of agreement with the US for co-operation in science and technology for critical infrastructure protection and other homeland security matters.
	The agreement establishes a framework for co-operation in science and technology and formalises the UK's strong relationship with the US in scientific research and development. This includes: sharing scientific knowledge; increasing the exchange of information and personnel with expertise in these areas; and taking advantage of each country's respective research, development, testing and evaluation capacities.
	The agreement represents the continuing commitment by the UK and the US to share knowledge, expertise and research in addition to development, testing and evaluation capabilities that will help us find the best technologies and tools to prepare and protect our citizens.